


Casual Observations

by whisperbird



Category: Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-12-19
Updated: 2006-12-19
Packaged: 2018-01-25 08:31:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,661
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1641620
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whisperbird/pseuds/whisperbird
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ford and Arthur catch up. Of course, this being Ford and Arthur, it never IS really catching up.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Casual Observations

**Author's Note:**

> The hardest story ever since I am very new to this pairing! Big big thanks to Fiona Fawkes for the speedy and wonderful beta!
> 
> Written for Megolas

 

 

The moonlight drifted in hazily from the window, weak and flitting behind the clouds and falling in a cross shadow from the steel bars. A pair of feet pounded back and forth on the cement floor, clicking loudly and then softly as they landed on a patch of worn carpet, half-stripped from the cell. It was cold inside, and the figure attached to the feet was hugging himself, rubbing his hands and letting out his breath in a fog. He wasn't pacing to keep warm, though it was helping -- pacing helped him think and looked a bit dramatic to his companion. The companion, who sat in the corner on a chain-hung bed, expected an idea from him and perhaps making a show of thinking would keep him quiet.

"You've been pacing an awful long time," the companion observed, through teeth clenched from the cold.

The pacing figure didn't stop and ignored this piece of information. He'd forgotten the nature of humans for a moment and had he grown in a society apt to sarcasm, he would've said something like, "Do you really think?" but he had not, so it made a better statement just to ignore his friend. He didn't need silence since he wasn't really thinking, but he didn't need to be annoyed either.

"Because, you know, it's rather cold in here," his companion started again.

The pacing figure stopped and turned to look at his friend, his lips blue, which clashed with his red hair a bit. He cocked and eyebrow and said, "Is it?"

"Is that sarcasm?"

The figure started pacing again.

"Yes it is, suspect it comes from hanging around you too long."

"I could say the same about you and my newly acquired insanity."

"No one is sane," said the pacer, stopping for a moment, as his feet were numb. "Everyone is born insane and whether you cultivate a sense normalcy is entirely up to you."

"Well, I was sane before I met you." The friend shifted position and said, "Or at least I think I was. Maybe I was insane and this is sanity. I've not been exposed to anything I consider normal in years, so I don't have anything to compare it to ..."

"What's normal?" said the pacer. He sat down on the chain bed beside his friend and jutted his jaw. "Don't answer, that was rhetoric."

"But a good question. I have an answer. Earth, Earth was normal."

"You had holidays where you dressed up and rang up the neighbors for sweets. And others where you chopped down trees and stuffed presents under them. How is that normal?"

"Insults!" The friend looked uncomfortable for a moment and said slowly, "Maybe normal is subjective ..."

"So then," the red-haired-pacing-now-sitting man with a smile, "being stranded in a cold prison on a planet with three moons could be normal."

"Ford," said the friend (and that was the pacing man's name, Ford), "you don't have any idea how to get us out, do you?"

"No."

"Ah." The friend (whose name was Arthur), frowned.

"Will it make you feel better if I pace a bit more and occasionally swear?"

"... yes."

"Then I suppose I will if you'll be quiet."

"I sense you're angry with me."

Ford didn't answer, but walked faster and swore. Arthur sighed a bit, happy the plan for their escape was evidently in motion.

It wasn't, but Ford knew Arthur had grown to believing in the unbelievable. He had to, he lived it and lived with it sometimes.

The whole mess -- the fight, the bar, the weird jailer, the cold jail -- had started with a conversation about the unbelievable. Which actually was the weather, but it progressed. And there was alcohol involved. Alcohol was always involved in the birth of everything, usually including people. And most of these births, like people, are mistakes.

Hindsight was 20/20, however. If Ford had known he would be in the position he was in at the moment, he would've never suggested they use a drinking game to catch up. Afterall, it was just one drinking game. What trouble had being drunk ever caused?

*

Two men, one named Ford and the other named Arthur, entered the bar. The bar was a saloon type, with all sorts of interesting characters sitting, drinking, being noisy, playing pool and doing all the kinds of things people did in this sort of setting.

No one paid them any mind when they found a seat and gestured to the bartender. No one really should've. They blended in well, a little careworn, one, Arthur, with a look apprehension on his face and the other, Ford, a pre-drinking sort of lopsided grin.

"What kind of a place is this?" Arthur gave the place a look-over, and finding it not much to look at, turned back to the bar.

"You'll like it," replied Ford, whose smile didn't fade in the least when he saw the look on his friend's face.

"I don't believe you."

"Ah, nothing's changed."

For a casual observer not versed well in the madness of their friendship, it would look like a friendly drink; the kind two friends who hadn't seen each other (read: gotten drunk together) in quite a while and felt this was needed to remedied would have. The casual observer might note their manner in speaking, how they were bickering like an old married couple.

Then the casual observer might wonder if they were an old married couple and assure you that there is nothing wrong with that because, he, casual observer, is a modern man.

Whatever they were, it was easy for the casual observer (who, if he is still staring by this point isn't casual and is most likely a weirdo) to tell that these men were both familiar with each other's idiosyncrasies; enough that it plainly annoyed them both, but not enough for either of them to take offense.

For while there are few things are shorter than love (like maybe a shooting star or a blown dandelion) and few things that last longer than hate (like maybe fruitcake from the only relative in your entire family that cannot cook so that sits in your pantry until St. Patty's, but by then it's turned a bit green so you re-gift it because no one will eat it anyway) there is the oft-undiscussed state of being that is the seed for a lasting companionship. Maybe the casual observer understood this and looked away before someone mentioned his staring.

The state is in the middle, a curious place of relating where you've gone past hate back to love and gone past love back to hate. It's something that defines the old married couple that there is nothing wrong with or the two fishing buddies who love to hate each other as much as they cannot do without the other.

Or the hitchhiker and his human companion, as these two were.

Ford, who was the hitchhiker of the two, set his satchel down near his feet and cleared his throat once, then again. Finally the bartender, who was wiping a filthy glass over and over like an extra in a western, took notice and walked over.

Ford held up two fingers and said, "Something strong."

This made Arthur groan. "Not a Gargle Blaster," he said quickly.

"Gargle Blaster?" the man answered in a guttural voice. "We don't sell girly drinks here."

"Ford." Arthur looked over his shoulder and tapped his foot on the rung of the barstool. "Let's go."

"Is there a house special?" Ford asked, undeterred.

"How tall are ya, son?"

"Excuse me?"

"How tall are ya?"

Thinking it best not to say around five foot six, but eighty feet in some plant measurements, Ford replied, "Together we're over eleven feet."

"I'll getcha two straws then."

"Wait wait wait," said Arthur, who forced himself to look away from the rest of the bar, the thought of sharing a drink with Ford and what the hairy gentleman next to him might think causing him a little incentive to assert himself.

But Ford had already cleared the matter and ordered a pitcher of a beer he'd never heard of, but he'd never really met a drink he didn't like. He showed the bartender his card (for free drinks, being a hitchhiker), which, according to the man, "Didn't impress him".

"Well," said Arthur, "This is the first bar I've ever been to that didn't speak of the Gargle Blaster in a religious way. You should tell Zaphod next time you see him."

"I wouldn't. He'd probably kill himself. He takes his corruption very seriously."

"When you said we'd meet for lunch, this isn't exactly what I had in mind."

"Live a little, Arthur!" Ford clapped Arthur on the back as the bartender set down a pitcher and two dirty glasses, raised his shaggy eyebrows and walked off. "This is considered one of the best bars in this part of the galaxy. And by best I mean the one you'll get drunk in quickest. Not that that matters to you any."

"But you said lunch."

"It's past lunch time. They have food here. Or what passes as. They have some sort of wings here. Not chicken; some other sort of bird. Probably tastes like chicken, though. Everything does."

"I'll pass. It's hard to imagine, but I will."

"Suit yourself." Ford took a swallow of the frothy drink in front of him and swallowed quickly, simply so he could say, "Wowee!"

Arthur took a sip and spat his back into the glass.

"This is some stuff," said Ford approvingly.

"I think I'll pass, again." Arthur looked glumly at his drink. He didn't consider himself to be a soft man when it came to alcohol, but there's a difference between living a little and a living very little time. It didn't even taste like beer to him.

"We have all of this to get through," said Ford, who didn't seem to mind doing it himself.

Arthur dared another sip and held it in his mouth. The hairy fellow next to him was looking as though he had the thought that if Arthur didn't finish, he'd finish it for him, backwash and all, invited or not. He swallowed it quickly.

"You know, we'll never get drunk this way," Ford pointed out.

"I wasn't intending to."

"We could play a drinking game."

"I thought you wanted to catch up!"

"Well, we can do both, can't we?"

"Hmm," said Arthur darkly. "I have a feeling that in about three more sips you won't remember your own name, let alone what we've been doing since we last saw each other."

"It's a good idea."

"I don't know any games. And I'm hungry and don't feel like any mystery wings. We could go somewhere else."

"I already know a game."

"How did I know you were going to say that?" Arthur muttered. "Oh yes, because I know you."

"It's the best way to catch up," Ford said lightly.

"We could just talk. Do people talk anymore?"

"No," said Ford, waving his hand at the bartender.

"Oh."

"But it's interesting. You'll see."

"All right," said Arthur, who didn't recognize the reluctance in his voice because he'd heard it so often. "How do you play?"

"One person says something that happened to them in the last six months and the next person has to top that."

"How --"

"Purely subjective. If one feels they've topped that, the person they topped must take a drink. If they haven't bested them, the second person takes a drink. In most cases, being subjective, both parties take a drink. It's mainly just to get pissed," Ford added. "Nobody wins."

"So why do you play?"

"Why does anyone play drinking games?"

Arthur's mouth twitched as he thought. Ford was ordering some of the wings and some legs in a spicy sauce. Arthur's stomach gurgled.

"So what happens if nothing happened to you in the last six months?"

"That's the sort of question I knew you'd ask," said Ford, "So, I was about to tell you that you can go further back than that." He motioned to his glass for himself and then Arthur's before sliding it closer to him. Arthur looked at it doubtfully.

"I saw a ghost," said Ford baldly.

"Oh?"

"Yes."

"Ah."

"Can't top it?" Ford lifted own his glass and waved it a bit at Arthur, the light from the dusty window catching the liquid in a fun, sinister manner.

"I didn't say that," said Arthur. "I'm thinking."

"If you have to think, you probably can't."

"No, I'm thinking if this is actually true."

"I'm insulted you wouldn't believe me. Do I have to tell you my other ghost stories? Do you want truth collateral? All right, this one time I lived in a two-level flat and the top story was haunted."

Arthur had heard this story before. Ford was sick of hearing the noises and being worried, so he bought a cat for blaming security. It made him feel safer knowing that the bumps coming from upstairs could be the cat. Everything could be blamed on the feline, even when the cat was winding its way round his legs and there was an audible roaring coming from the second story. So for extra security he bought a cat for the upstairs as well as the downstairs. This sounded good in theory, but the upstairs cat quite liked to hang around downstairs, and everyone knows there is nothing quite as unsettling as hearing a thump, looking up from a book, blaming the cat and then realizing both are snuggling in the hamper across the room.

Ford in the end just moved out and gave the cats away to the next occupant with a warning that they didn't quite work well and the person might invest in a guard dog.

It wasn't that he was afraid, he always said, it was that he was smart. When it came to fight or flight, he took the best of both worlds; he would run away, but with a club of some sort in hand.

Arthur never liked hearing these stories simply because he believed them and didn't want Ford to know. That's not the point of ghost stories; you're not supposed to believe them. And it worried him that he did because in relation to his friend, they seemed almost normal. Ford may as well have said, "I got home, fixed some tea, put on some sprouts and watched the news."

"So every bit of that's true, then? What about the ghost you saw sixth months ago?"

Arthur's stomach gurgled again, so he bravely grabbed a wing from the plate in front of them. He nibbled it doubtfully, chewed it and found it to actually taste good, if a little bit spicy. He ate the rest quickly because he didn't want Ford to know he liked it.

"I never found out exactly how haunted it was," Ford said, absolving himself from all sort of blame if the story was a sham, "only that it sounded like a pub on any given holiday, even little useless bank holidays no one remembers."

"But did you technically see a ghost?"

"Why are we arguing about it? It's not my fault your disbelief won't suspend. Besides," he added, "I did."

"We're arguing because I need to know whether I should take a drink or not."

"You won't even try to top it?"

"Ford, drink if you feel you must. I know that's what you're hinting at."

Ford did so, with relish.

"Right," he said after taking a long sip.

"You are right I can't top it. I've only seen a ghost one. Zaphod's relative, you remember?"

"Well, how about you?" said Ford, attacking a wing and cocking his head. "Got something to contribute or are you going to sit there and drink to my adventures?"

"I met a girl," said Arthur.

Ford took three sips, all in a row.

"What?" Arthur said, outraged. "You didn't tell me we were supposed to sip for every instance it happened."

"New rule."

"Was it there before? Besides, you didn't let me finish. It didn't go anywhere."

Ford swallowed the meat in his mouth. "Then why did you mention it?"

"Because the relationship itself didn't work out. I was curious if you were having the same luck since we parted ways."

The hairy gent next to them, not wanting them to know he was eavesdropping, got a bit uncomfortable but didn't say anything.

Ford made a face that could only be described as quirky twitch. "None of my relationships are really that sort, the sort you're talking about."

They were quiet for a moment. The hairy man prayed they wouldn't do anything he as the casual observer didn't deem manly.

"I'll put it another way," said Arthur, "I had a failed relationship with a girl."

Ford gave him a bit of a glum look, and then drank three times.

They were silent again. Ford drained the rest of his glass.

"I think I ruined the game," said Arthur.

"Here's a new game: let's shut up and get pissed."

"I was really interested in knowing what had gone on," Arthur ventured again.

Ford looked at him with a mouthful of beer. He swallowed and refilled himself.

Arthur sat and looked into the glass, which was about half empty. Years ago, he might've said it was half full. There'd been so many things that had happened between now and Earth and he found himself thinking for a bit what it was like in the beginning. He'd never possessed the sort of adventurous spirit that Ford had. It was like adventure found him.

But more and more these days, when he dwelled on years ago, in the Heart of Gold he found he didn't regret his decision to go with Ford and that confused him on many levels. For years he was sure he'd rather have stayed behind -- he would've died peacefully instead of all the excruciatingly painful ways he almost died. He was seeing now as the years progressed, to his reluctance, how amazing these years had been. The confusion was in that as amazing as they were, the years had been awful. But were they better than death?

In a way he had secretly envied Trillian and her detached manner of dealing with their planet but in the end no one really escapes anything. Something Random said came back to him. Trillian had wished she'd never left the planet, that she'd rather died. Even though he didn't know it when his daughter had said that, it would stick with him for years and come back at the oddest times.

Times like now.

Ford was silent next to him, either scheming or lost in his thoughts. Arthur was having a montage of memories race through his head without his consent in a manner that, if this happened to be a movie, it would be accompanied by sickly sweet music and a blurry overtone.

"I did kill the game, didn't I?" said Arthur.

Ford didn't answer.

"Didn't you say you had another game?"

Ford waved his hand, a little unsteadily. "I do have one. It's called Truth or Drink."

"Sounds like Truth or Dare."

"Oh, there isn't any schoolgirls involved."

"I'd figured that, Ford."

"Why are you so keen to drink all of a sudden?" Ford looked at him out of the corner of his eye.

"I suddenly feel the urge to get drunk and fast. I seemed to recall you're good for it."

"This is how it works," said Ford, excited to have his mind off whatever his mind had gotten on, getting off that and getting on with drinking "one asks another a question, the other answers truthfully. The other one answers. You both drink."

"That's all?"

"That's all."

"What if you don't feel like telling the truth or there isn't a truth?"

"You don't answer and you both drink."

"I have a bit of a feeling you're just making this up as you go along."

Ford refilled their glasses; Arthur's just needed topping off a bit.

"You go first," said Arthur.

"Hmm ... worst present you ever received."

"I always got green cake on St. Patrick's Day from my sister," said Arthur.

The both drank.

"My turn? Oh, right." Arthur thought for a moment. Arthur realized he couldn't think of anything. It came from being around someone who had, plainly, done it all. "Worst ... drink you've ever had?"

"The one I didn't drink!" said Ford loudly and they both took a drink, Ford taking two. Then Ford took another.

Arthur paused for a moment. He was torn between two impulses -- the one to drink away his problems and the one not to drink so as to avoid any more problems he might have to drink away. Ford wasn't a different person exactly when he was drunk -- he was actually just himself, but up to volume ten. Or eleven.

Arthur swished the drink in his glass a bit, making a show of wanting to drink.

"I don't want to ask again," said Arthur. "This is turning into an interview."

Ford swallowed. "All right, I'll ask. Worst tea you ever had?"

"You say that like tea is all that I drink," said Arthur. "Well, it's a bit true. But. The Sirius Cybernetics ... whatever it was supposed to be. I've never tasted anything like that before or since."

They each took a drink -- Ford a long, head-back one and Arthur a small sip.

Over the course of the next few minutes they exchanged a few more questions. Worse this time mainly, because Ford, becoming progressively more drunk, couldn't think of anything else. They both agreed by the third time Sirius Cybernetics was brought up that it should be agreed that anything involving it was the worst because it was a bit too easy and everything should be second worst.

"A big company like that," said Arthur, shaking his head, "Bit of a travesty."

"My uncle was a travesty," Ford slurred.

"How so?"

"He borrowed clothes from my aunt constantly. He fit into her skirts better than she did! Not that it was hard," he added.

"I think you mean "transvestite"," Arthur corrected.

"Both!" said Ford and laughed loudly and embarrassingly at his own joke. No one else, especially Arthur, laughed, leading to one of those wind-down laughs, where one bellows, looks about, sees no other hooting going on and slowly stops his own. He pressed his lips together and then, without waiting for another chance, grabbed the pitcher, poured out the rest in his glass and ran it straight down his throat. The terrible thing about drinking to forget embarrassing things is that as you become more drunk, you do more embarrassing things. It's a sort of catch--22. Arthur was impressed and a little disturbed.

"Maybe we ought to get out of here."

Ford was gone a little round the bend. Arthur could tell because he was finally quiet. Silence was something that rarely afflicted Ford.

"Arthur," he said quietly, "that man is looking at us.

"Well, I shouldn't wonder why ..."

"He is. He has been since we came in."

Arthur did that discreet I'm looking at you but not really sort of glance at the man, who happened to the hairy fellow. He had a shaggy beard and long hair. Wasn't very tall, nor very frightening, but he looked like he held his own against all sorts of opposition, most notably a trimmer.

Arthur changed the subject loudly. "Would you like to have a few more wings before we leave? They're getting --"

"Arthur, he's looking now," said Ford, looking the man in the eye.

The man's mouth twitched under the beard. Arthur assumed it did -- the spot where his mouth would've been did.

"See?" said Ford, not breaking eye contact.

"Ford that's --"

"Hey now," said the fellow. "Hey now, hey now. I'm not lookin' at nothing."

"You're looking at me."

"I am now!"

"You admit it," slurred Ford jabbed a finger where he thought the man was, roughly a few feet in the opposite direction.

"Well, I can't help but look when you're looking at me!" The man's voice was getting louder.

"Arthur, hold my drink," said Ford, handing Arthur the empty glass. "I think this man wants to fight."

"No, he doesn't," replied Arthur.

"Yeah, I do!" the hairy man said.

"That's it!" said Ford. "Arthur, I'm going to fight this man and his five brothers. Hold my drink."

Ford leaped to his feet and put up his fists. Arthur felt like he was watching a visual representation of Ford's answer next game if he asked for his "worst decision ever." Ford was now telling the man to fight like a man, asking him if he was scared, answering for the man saying he should be Ford as was over eleven feet tall.

Then the man stood up.

He was, without a doubt, one of the tallest men Arthur had ever seen.

His torso wasn't that large, given the illusion of normal height when he was seated, but his legs must've been almost as tall as Arthur. His shaggy head brushed the ceiling as he look down at Ford, who seemed unfazed, probably because he thought it was a trick of the alcohol.

"Ah, now there are five of him vert--vertcal--vertic ... up and down!" said Ford.

"No," said Arthur, trying to keep his mouth unagape, "that's just the one man."

"Ah."

"Yes."

"Oh."

The man swung out a fist and connected with Ford's jaw. It wasn't a terrible blow as the man's fists were disproportionate to legs, but it had enough strength behind it from the height to knock Ford from his feet. He landed in a dust cloud on the dirty floor. He lay there for a second, then stood up again, eyes closed, holding his jaw.

"Arthur," he said, "tell me about that space buggy that just hit me. It must've been a small space buggy."

"It was that man's fist."

"I see you're up!" said the man.

Ford, eyes closed, held up both of his fists.

"I'm going into this like a man," said Ford. "With my eyes closed. A blind man, if you will."

*

A few streets over, a policeman's hovercar was gliding over the sandy streets. He was a bland sort of man. His hovercar license probably read "brown/brown/medium height." His partner was off for the night, and this town, despite its rough reputation was eerily silent. So of course he was patrolling the streets looking for someone to take downtown for the hell of it. It was what policemen did.

Were he English, he would've probably enjoyed tea and cricket and had a "Roundabouts of Croydon" calendar without any sort of irony. He enjoyed his life because there wasn't much else.

Earlier that day he'd stopped some kids, but it turned out they were only dealing drugs not doing anything dangerous like trading cards. Then he'd stopped a purse snatcher -- the thief, caught up in getting away, almost fell into an uncovered manhole! He stopped the fellow, told him a better street to get away and gave a ticket to the men who were fixing the streets.

Perhaps the reason it was quiet tonight to him but seemed like such a rough neighborhood to most outsiders was the opposite sense of justice, in a way.

He leaned back in his seat and rubbed his back. He just wanted to get a drink and go home, maybe watch some tri-D. You couldn't drink on patrol, though.

Unless you were patrolling a bar.

He swung a left and almost hit an old lady, on his way to the perfect spot.

*

"It's brave of ya," said the hairy man, pushing up his sleeves. "Looking at death like this."

"Yes, but I'm not looking at you."

"Your eyes are pointed in my direction. So you're facing death."

*

The policeman pulled up outside and ignored the parking meter. He was a service to this town; he didn't to do silly things like obey the law. He stepped out of his car, whistling. He was the law.

The hairy man cracked his knuckles. Arthur swallowed. Ford groped around for his drink.

The man stepped forward. He glowered at Ford. He took another step. Glowered a bit more. It went on in this fashion for a second in a totally anticlimatic way that would make this a pretty boring bar brawl story. He took another step, his fist out, sweat on his nose (?), a grimace on his mouth (?), he eyes slanted --

And he fell. Loudly.

Underneath his foot was Ford's satchel. The man, despite his towering height, had rather thin legs. He fell over like a bowl of upturned spaghetti, legs everywhere, passed out.

At that moment the policeman walked through the door.

All he saw was Ford's raised fists, a man on the floor and something to do on a Saturday evening.

*

"This wouldn't have happened if you had not wanted to get drunk."

"You wanted to as well!" countered Ford.

"Not at first."

It was a few hours later, in the cold jail cell. The planet, though hot and dusty in the day, became freezing at night. The prison had no heating.

"It was very stupid, if you don't remember what you did."

"I don't."

"That's why I'm telling you."

"Have you since made a hobby of staring down death?"

Ford gave a very out-of-place, but very Ford-like smile. Arthur, on instinct, felt a chill.

"I wouldn't have died," he said. "I'm too young to die."

*

Death, Ford didn't know, was no respecter of age, but according to many, he did respect the government who was his best client (and this includes organized crime), musicians who lived over the age of twenty-seven (because few did) and people willing to eat coconut pieces in chocolate boxes (because even he knew that those were a fate worse than himself.)

*

People die at any time, Arthur knew this. It had almost happened to him on a regular basis since meeting Ford. The first time they went out to drink and eat Arthur had almost choked on a fish bone. While not expressly Ford's fault, it had happened around him so it counted in Arthur's book. He almost pointed it out, but figured it useless.

"You're always trouble," he did point out.

It was the subject of death that had, oddly, brought this entire thing about. Arthur couldn't deal with it. Life was complicated enough without thinking about the peace of death.

"Not always trouble."

"Well, don't you think it's funny that you're always around me when there is trouble?"

"I don't find that very funny."

"What do you find funny?"

Ford leaned his head against the bars and gave a sidelong look to Arthur. "Science channels from primitive sectors of space."

"That was a bit random."

"You asked."

"I didn't know you were interested in science."

"I'm not. It's a bit like humans watching monkeys make tools. So primitive, so determined. You laugh and say in your head, bless them, they try." Ford looked back at the bars to the amazingly uninteresting empty cell across from theirs. "

"I don't laugh." Arthur paused for a moment. "Chimp jokes are rather childish, don't you think?"

"Only to you, you're an ape descendant. You're probably subconsciously offended on some racial memory level."

"I'm offended on many levels."

There was silence while Ford, after grappling with the idea for a moment, took back to his pacing

"Useless conversation isn't going to get us out of jail."

Useless pacing wasn't either, but Arthur didn't complain because every time Ford was seized with a fit of it, he hoped he had an idea.

"Ford," Arthur said, watching him wear a hole in the floor, "I've been thinking."

"About how to get us out?"

"No."

"Then I really don't care."

"No," Arthur replied. "About if I had to do it all again. If I had to leave again."

Ford didn't reply.

"I would."

For a moment Ford stopped and everything became uncomfortable. Arthur didn't know it, but Ford didn't quite know what to say back other than, "Of course, you would be dead" but it didn't seem right. Arthur took his silence for embarrassment, when Ford was really grappling with his next sentence.

He sat down on the cold bench by Arthur.

"Of course, you'd be dead," he said anyway.

There was silence in the jail cell, as the wind whistled through the window near the ceiling. It was broken by a slight chattering of teeth by Arthur.

"Ford, I'm cold."

"We could huddle for warmth."

"Are we going to die?"

"Have we died yet?"

"Did you really see a ghost, Ford?"

"What do you think?"

Arthur thought he should move a bit closer to Ford.

*

When the policeman came back in the morning to let them out, he found them both snuggled up, one arm around the other on the cold bench, sleeping peacefully. He almost woke them up, but didn't, because two boys like that just looked so sweet. He'd wake them later and let them be on their way.

It would be a few hours before Arthur woke with a start, saw Ford across from him, panicked briefly, remembered he didn't get drunk and then realize Ford had his arm wrapped around him.

It would be a few days before Ford decided to drink again. Well, a day and a half.

It would be a few weeks before they would see each other again and surreptitiously take a nap together because, in each other's arms, it was the best sleep they'd ever had, but neither of them would admit it.

But right now, to the casual observer, they seemed to fit together in each other's arms almost perfectly; a puzzle of arms in an expression of manlove. Nonsexual manlove. Accidental, nonsexual manlove.

Not that there was anything wrong with that.

 


End file.
